Gathering Growing Going
Meals are so important in the history of God’s mob – they shape fellowship and community by remembering the acts of God. The first and greatest was the Passover meal. It marked the remembrance of the great salvation by God, of His people, from slavery. Described in Exodus 11-13, it was a meal that remembered the moment of salvation (when God brought the judgement of death on the firstborn in Egypt), the means of salvation (God’s action and the sacrifice of a perfect animal), and the nation created by the salvation (God’s people, descended from Abraham, were saved so that they could gather with God and worship him). Celebrated annually, it shaped the people of God, defining them by God’s salvation of them. But they could never dwell with Him or worship Him – because of sin. They needed a greater salvation. And so, when Jesus gathers His disciples to celebrate the Passover on the evening of His betrayal, only hours before His death… well, you join the dots!
God’s covenant of grace with His people stands: one of Abraham’s seed will beat sin, and change the sinful nature of people, so that God can dwell with His mob again. Circumcision is the picture God gave His people, which pointed to this promise. This promise could only happen by God’s work alone. At the end of the Old Testament, this promise stands. At the start of the New Testament, there is the hope of a ‘new beginning’ (Matt.1:1). This hope is followed by a genealogy which traces the ‘seed [singular] of Abraham’ down to Jesus (Matt.1:2-17). Jesus is described as the One who will ‘save His people from their sins’ (Matt.1:21). And then He does – through His life, death and resurrection alone, Jesus offers the forgiveness of sins and changed nature for God’s people. As Jesus sends His people out to proclaim this to the world, He does so with a picture that points back to who fulfils the promise of God: the picture of baptism points BACK to Jesus! And the work He achieved is received by trusting in what He has done!
In His last days on earth, Jesus instructed His disciples to continually practice two sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s supper as signs of God’s saving grace towards us in Jesus. Jesus here continues God’s practice in the Old Testament of using pictures and words to teach His people about His abiding grace towards a sinful humanity. Often in the Old Testament, God gave a sign to accompany His covenant with His people. For example, when God made a covenant with Abraham to bless the whole world through his offspring, He gave him the sign of circumcision. Circumcision symbolized God’s promise to cleanse sinners through Abraham’s seed.
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